1/3 Queens and Jacks

Well you said MP is a wide opener - this seems like a great spot to squeeze the only concern is the 20 sizing standard? Not sure why you donk this flop - as played call and see a turn.

Donking this flop is a huge mistake. Sure sometimes we get called by worse but we are folding out air that should bet this flop a lot.

I would 3b pre unless he has sizing tells.

Maybe you missed that this was multi-way. I folded out MP - would not have donked heads up - definitely NOT a huge mistake.

I rarely raise from the BB in any situation preflop - you don’t benefit shoving money in the pot OOP. Position is a HUGE part of my game.

It’s kinda strange that you ask what hero should do and get no answer - instead you get everything you should have done previously

On my shortstack of $200 I would mostly squeeze preflop (either to a size that sets up a PSB jam on the flop or more likely just a shove now). Deeper facing a rather huge open, even from a wide guy, I'll admit I do start playing a lot more passive here. Give me a slightly smaller sizing (which often indicates a weaker hand), more callers (more dead money to go after / more players to deny equity too), smaller stacks, position, etc. the more I'd squeeze. I think flatting is ~ok here but I think I'll be outvoted on that.

If we're not squeezing preflop it's cuz we're a little concerned we're up against better, and now all the Qx hands just got there too, so I'm not sure I like the donk. I'd probably just check/evaluate.

Super weird spot facing this massive raise. I mean, on the one hand you wouldn't think a Qx would ever do that. But could he still be doing with better (AA/KK flatting as first caller preflop is a thing)? Think I just sigh fold and try to get a better handle on this guy before comitting non-short stacks.

GcluelessNLnoobG

I think the idea is if you want to have more of a chance to play it better (ie +EV) next time, you have to make the easier decisions correctly.
Preflop is debatable as either a call or 3b but the flop donk is pretty much uniformly hated.

AP, we don't know if BTN is "information raising" with like TT-66 or is fat-value raising AA-KK or quads. I guess you can call and see if he slows down on the turn but I certainly wouldn't 3bet.

Obviously call, he’s basically repping quads and worse boats.

Way to fold out the guy who was about to cbet with 0-4 outs.

Hero re-raises 250
Villain folds

I'll ask the same question I always do of you when you take your aggressive line:

What do you think your aggressive line accomplished?

Overall, there's only two main reasons to bet (to get worse hands to call or better hands to fold), and on early streets there is only one other main reason (to protect our equity when we're ahead). Does our aggressive action really accomplish any of this?

Gnothatin',justsayin'G

I also feel raise preflop would been better given we are OOP. I also don't get this flop reraise. You fold out any hand except for Qx, AA, KK, TT, probably some 99. Why not just keep them in? Any card other than A/K on turn or river pretty much guarantees a checks through. If he raise once on turn or river just snap call.

I'm squeezing pre into a wide opener + dead money. If we collect $41 less rake uncontested, that's an excellent result with JJ OOP.

I x/c flop to most action. I never donk here.

BTN range that beats us is Qx/KK/AA. We can heavily discount AA / KK due to preflop action. Qx rarely raises flop. I call and then station down unless another Q or an A hits the board.

I'm raising pre for sure, especially against an MP that opens wide and with us OOP.

As played - People love to slow play quads at low stakes, and given that villain would likely 3 bet AA/KK, we very likely have the best hand. I like the small raise targetting like TT/99. I think if he jams we probably sigh call.

I asked what to do and got no answers….

So I revealed - and now the criticism comes

I knew gg wouldn’t like this, but I can’t wander thru the hand wondering if he’s got a queen. It’s very hard to call without a queen and that’s fine. I’m not looking for big value here, I’m trying to avoid losing my stack.

If he tells me he’s got a queen, I can get out of the way. It’s not always about making better hands fold and worse hands call - sometimes it’s find out ‘right now’ are you better than me? You’re going to get a straight answer here.

Maybe just my style

I don’t think you will sell me on raising from the bb. Don’t tell anyone, but I only do it with AA and KK. Simply not going to bloat a pot OOP.

I might get aggressive later, but I will usually either defend or fold. I don’t make my money like this, I do that from in position.

You got answers bro, 5 people ITT said what they would do as played.

Raising $140 for purely for information is not great. You only know he doesn't have a queen if he folds, what if he calls or raises?

IMO this is not a difficult spot because ranges are so well defined and 95% of low stakes players don't blast off OTF with obvious quads on ultra-dry boards. We're probably good, let him continue with all his bluffs or maybe he thinks 99 is good here, whatever.

I was wrong when I thought the flop donk was the most egregious error in the hand. Why are you trying to let him play perfectly?

Finding out where you’re at is not a thing in poker. Why do you need jacks? Make him tell you where he’s at when you have 7 high.

No raise OOP explained - my style I guess

But this is helpful
Making a smaller raise would be better

We could shrug and say "you do you" but we could also challenge you to rethink your "style". It's been said "Keep your identity small" when it comes to being successful in life.

For my part I try to have a more open minded view of different ways of playing a hand, and maybe the benefit of this one helps in metagame/image.

As WereBeer says, you only know he doesn't have a Q if he folds. If he calls, you really have no idea either way. And meanwhile, the pot has ballooned to $560 and we have a lol 40% PSB left of $230. Heck, if he was getting tricky and taking a very uncommon line of raising the flop with a Q, he can easily just check back the turn and then shove for lol 40% PSB on the river; are we folding after checking two consecutive streets to him?

GcluelessNLnoobG

O I am very open-minded and making adjustments all the time. I’m listening to you people. Always looking for a better way.

Yes, I would squeeze here. MP doesn't necessarily need a big hand to open for a raise. BTN is mostly capped when he flat calls. When our read is that MP is opening wide, we want him to know we're going to aggressively defend our BB.

In another thread, you talked about leveraging your image. This is a good spot. You may or may not have the best hand, but they're likely to give you credit for having a very tight range, especially when you raise from the BB, which means you can expect them to 4B AA/KK and possibly fold QQ/AK.

If they flat call, you can probably discount the likelihood that they have QQ+/AK, and so you can credibly rep a lot of hands on boards with over-cards to your JJ. If the board comes J-high, they'll under-estimate how often you have JJ, and they may try to rep Jx. They'll be more likely to over-play their lower sets and 2P.

Not sure why you're donking on the QQQ flop. You don't beat much other than TT/99 and AK. I'd rather just check-call flop and check-evaluate turn.

Fair enough.

Q-high boards tend to favor BTN callers in raised pots. The reason is that when there's a raise from EP/MP, the BTN is likely to raise with AA/KK/AK, so when BTN flat calls a raise, his range gets weighted towards combos like AQ/KQ/QJ.

It doesn't necessarily follow that Q-high boards are equally good for any pre-flop caller, like the BB. The BB has an incentive to defend with a wider range than the BTN, who didn't have any money in the pot before action got to him. The BTN can fold a lot of hands that the BB should continue with.

We shouldn't be flatting pre. We shouldn't be donking the flop. There aren't many hands BTN can have that A) didn't 3B pre, B) are worse than ours, and C) are going to want to raise when the OMC donks out, multi-way, on this QQQ flop.

So, he's either got the case Q, or he's bluffing. He may have every combo of AQ/KQ here (8 combos), and probably some other QX combos as well. If he'd 3B pre with AK, then his bluffs would be PP's or other combos below QX, which is to say, mostly combos that JJ has crushed, and are drawing dead or close to it.

Not sure what raising accomplishes, other than folding out his bluffs, and giving him more money when he has the case Q.

Donking flop is definitely not the play here.
How ever this hand plays out from here you are never getting 3 streets from anything worse.
There are no possible draws.

We can see from here your just ending up in a silly spot where any range you build for villain your going to be well ahead of, we basically have to call, and then call any turn. Villains range will become increasingly polarised with every bet made and in this spot based after the pre-flop action you have no choice but to just essentially call every street unless an A comes which we can fold to.

Check calling the flop on the other hand keeps villains range nice and wide. Loads of bluffs, low pairs he can have that we beat, (and any Q's will likely check back because they are scared of everyone folding).

We are massively ahead of villains c-bet range, but vs his raise range we are struggling. We obviously beat all of villains fold range.

Further point, without extra info 3ing JJ pre-flop is really borderline. We don't want to be in a massive multi-way pot particularly with JJ at this stage, but if we can isolate a player with a 3 bet then it's definitely the play.